There’s a minstrel who travels from village to village, strumming his guitar and singing songs. His songs tell tales of “a being most abhorred — the biggest pig-faced idiot — who ever held a sword.” Well, he actually has two swords. Does that mean that he is twice as good as a normal swordsman, or does that mean that he needs two swords just to equal a normal swordsman?

Groo is a barbarian, you see. He is very good at “vanquishing hordes of evil invaders!” Like the minstrel, Groo goes from village to village. He looks for someone to give him a job. “A job and then some money.” But if they wish to give him money without the job, he wouldn’t object. Groo is a stumble bum, though. His heart is always in the right place, but disasters are just unavoidable with this guy. This stuff is crazy funny. It’s crazy funny in the sense that Monty Python stuff is crazy funny. Groo also has a trusty sidekick in the form of a dog named Rufferto.

The minstrel is holed up in a tavern, singing his songs to the patrons. His songs tell of one mishap after another. After every song, the crowd becomes angry. They don’t find the humor in the songs and the songs are quite insulting. Groo is their hero. Groo is their champion. He protects the people of Plentia from their evil king who keeps them from selling their crops. The minstrel is beside himself at Groo’s seeming turn of intelligence and behavior.

The fun doesn’t stop there, folks! There’s more, but I will say no more. I don’t want to spoil your dollar. Go pick this issue up and it will be a dollar well spent! Sergio Aragones (of MAD Magazine fame) will have you laughing your ass off and then spending an hour looking for it. It’s really great stuff. Unlike the Usagi Yojimbo #1 for $1, the story has an ending. Speaking of Usagi Yojimbo, every one of Groo’s mishaps have been lettered by Stan Sakai, Usagi’s creator.

The only thing that sucks about getting introduced to Groo in this way, is that there isn’t anything currently going that you could go down to your local comics shop and add to your pull list. The most recent thing wrapped in March of 2010, and the trade paperback came out this past July. It was a mini-series called Groo: The Hogs of Horder. You can follow this link over to Dark Horse, where you can get your hands on The Hogs of Horder and other great Groo issues and paperbacks.

I fell in love with Sergio when he was doing MAD. When Groo first came out, I was first in line – I think I have them all someplace. Groo was my favorite of all, and I loved to sit down and just laugh out loud at the antics Sergio invented. Love me some MORE Groo!